Supporting arts and culture to enforce community values

The Saison Culturelle is one of the major cultural events organised by the Aosta Valley regional administration. This festival is aimed to promote arts and culture mainly for the local population. Originally it was designed to promote in this small alpine region a wider overview of the artistic international production and to support and disseminate the knowledge, comprehension and use of the French language. Indeed, Aosta Valley is an autonomous region of Italy, recognised in this status by the Constitution, even because its history is deeply steeped in a French-speaking culture. Initially proposed by a group of cultural organisations in 1983/1984, the Saison Culturelle has become, over the years, one of the flagships of the Aosta Valley regional administration cultural proposals. Compared to the beginning, this festival boasts today a variety of shows, from theatre plays to different kinds of music recitals and conferences. Until now no specific studies have not been carried on despite the importance of the festival for Aosta Valley cultural scene. So, the research aims to investigate what is its importance as a public good supported by public funding. Moreover, it has been studied in which way the Saison Culturelle is a contribution to the identity of the local community. The research firstly analyses, through documents provided by one of the officials of the regional administration of Aosta Valley in charge of the management of the Saison Culturelle, the reasons and the background of the Festival organisation. From these data, the research tries to to point out the social reputation of French-speaking culture as a motivation for the public administration spending for the Saison Culturelle. Afterwards, through a series of semi-structured interviews with a selected group of politicians, officials of the regional public administration and some specialists in charge of the expertise for the cultural program, the current situation is studied, seeking to understand the reasons that justify the support of the regional administration to this festival. These interviews will also enable to understand some collateral elements such as the role of the identity and the culture and tradition of this alpine community. The results provide useful information in two directions: on one side, a model of analysis and evaluation is applied to this specific cultural festival allowing the appreciation of the relationship between the regional funding of a cultural event and the creation of a public good consisting in the reinforcing of community identity. On the other hand, the research provides the organisers of the Saison Culturelle with some reflexions that can help them in understanding whether they are still pursuing the original motivations which gave birth to the festival and whether the festival really contributes to cultural participation.